[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[jnc]

    > From: Larry McVoy

    > If it really was just about his views, his views have been consistent
    > for a long time and MIT didn't care.

The outrage over Epstein is so un-balanced I have a strong desire to vomit.

Not that I have any feeling at all that Epstein didn't deserve what he got. My
disgust is that Roman Polanksi, who did exactly the same thing to a 13-year
old, was defended and lionized by a long list of entertainment world figures
after his arrest in Switzerland - many of whom are now falling all over
themselves to condemn Epstein.

If and when the mob howling over Epstein takes out after Polanki in the exact
same manner, then I'll take them seriously. Until then, they're a bunch of
virtue-signalling cretins.

	Noel

[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[lm]

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 12:02:28PM -0400, Noel Chiappa wrote:
>     > From: Larry McVoy
> 
>     > If it really was just about his views, his views have been consistent
>     > for a long time and MIT didn't care.
> 
> The outrage over Epstein is so un-balanced I have a strong desire to vomit.
> 
> Not that I have any feeling at all that Epstein didn't deserve what he got. My
> disgust is that Roman Polanksi, who did exactly the same thing to a 13-year
> old, was defended and lionized by a long list of entertainment world figures
> after his arrest in Switzerland - many of whom are now falling all over
> themselves to condemn Epstein.

I'm not defending Polanksi, he clearly should be held to account, having 
anything to do with a 13 year is all sorts of messed up.

I think the outrage of Epstein at MIT is more about MIT knowingly taking
money from a convicted pedophile who had a lot of rich friends, and then
trying to cover it up.  It's stunningly stupid that MIT would risk their 
reputation over $7.5M.  That's .1% of their endowment at the time.  The
people involved, in my opinion, should give the money to a worthy charity
and resign for the sake of the institution.  MIT doesn't deserve these
people, they need to go.

[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[clemc]

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 2:35 PM Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:

> I think the outrage of Epstein at MIT is more about MIT knowingly taking
> money from a convicted pedophile who had a lot of rich friends
>

I 100% agree.  This is revolting and it >>is<< a shame it has gone on and
people who should have/could have done something, have let it happen.

But my cynical self says that it is nothing new.  Look at the Kennedy's and
Harvard.  None of the Kennedy's could keep their pants zipped and JFK's
father was a bootlegger during prohibition. But we have another generation
throwing money around and people are cheering.

There was an article in today's globe about this very issue about the
schools.   Large orgs, like MIT and Harvard or my own CMU and UCB, are
fueled by money.  CMU always has been looking for ways to get more money
since Dick Cyert (had been head of the business school making it a top 5
B-school became president when I was there). Cyert straight out told the EE
and CS Depts were are going to monitize you.   He even did the same with
drama (supposedly CMU gets royalties from the hits that came out of there
like Godspell and a few others).

What was the line from 'The Right Stuff' - "No bucks, no Buck Rogers."
Slime like Epstein, Trump, or Michael Corleone for the matter, do look for
a way to be more legitimate in the eyes of the world.

Hey, new firms like Google and Amazon have hardly been immune to issues in
sr leadership. So, the key is that you need to have people leading
institutions that are willing to say, "wait a minute" and not let greed
overtaking doing what it proper.

But ... how .. you do it is as important as what you do.

Henry Kissenger once said, "Money is power.  But power is the ultimate
aphrodisiac."
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[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[imp]

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 1:04 PM Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> wrote:

>
>
> On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 2:35 PM Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:
>
>> I think the outrage of Epstein at MIT is more about MIT knowingly taking
>> money from a convicted pedophile who had a lot of rich friends
>>
>
> I 100% agree.  This is revolting and it >>is<< a shame it has gone on and
> people who should have/could have done something, have let it happen.
>
> But my cynical self says that it is nothing new.  Look at the Kennedy's
> and Harvard.  None of the Kennedy's could keep their pants zipped and JFK's
> father was a bootlegger during prohibition. But we have another generation
> throwing money around and people are cheering.
>
> There was an article in today's globe about this very issue about the
> schools.   Large orgs, like MIT and Harvard or my own CMU and UCB, are
> fueled by money.  CMU always has been looking for ways to get more money
> since Dick Cyert (had been head of the business school making it a top 5
> B-school became president when I was there). Cyert straight out told the EE
> and CS Depts were are going to monitize you.   He even did the same with
> drama (supposedly CMU gets royalties from the hits that came out of there
> like Godspell and a few others).
>
> What was the line from 'The Right Stuff' - "No bucks, no Buck Rogers."
> Slime like Epstein, Trump, or Michael Corleone for the matter, do look for
> a way to be more legitimate in the eyes of the world.
>
> Hey, new firms like Google and Amazon have hardly been immune to issues in
> sr leadership. So, the key is that you need to have people leading
> institutions that are willing to say, "wait a minute" and not let greed
> overtaking doing what it proper.
>
> But ... how .. you do it is as important as what you do.
>
> Henry Kissenger once said, "Money is power.  But power is the ultimate
> aphrodisiac."
>

I will note that while people weren't able to do large things, he
definitely wore out his welcome at several conferences where he was never
invited back. There's only so many issues that you can fight in the
large... They are quite tiring...

Warner
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[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[crossd]

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 2:35 PM Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:

> [snip]
> I think the outrage of Epstein at MIT is more about MIT knowingly taking
> money from a convicted pedophile who had a lot of rich friends, and then
> trying to cover it up.  It's stunningly stupid that MIT would risk their
> reputation over $7.5M.  That's .1% of their endowment at the time.  The
> people involved, in my opinion, should give the money to a worthy charity
> and resign for the sake of the institution.  MIT doesn't deserve these
> people, they need to go.
>

Exactly what Larry says. Polanski deserves everything that's coming to him,
and the hypocrisy of some in Hollywood is odious, but MIT (and other
institutions) really messed up by taking money from a known sex-offender
and trying to keep it quiet.

I'll admit that when I first heard about the Joi Ito thing, I thought,
"it's entirely possible he didn't know about Epstein's behavior...." But
then it became clear that he did and tried to cover it up. Are we going to
find out the same thing about Reif? How deep does this go?

They've sullied the institute's reputation for a (comparative) pittance.
For an institution chock full of incredibly brilliant people, that's just
some dumb shit: two bit street thugs have more sense.

        - Dan C.
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[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[crossd]

Richard Stallman, known colloquially as 'RMS', has resigned from MIT's
Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the Free
Software Foundation, after making comments defending Jeffrey Epstein, the
late sexual predator. Those comments sparked wide-spread outrage across the
MIT community and beyond.

https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#16_September_2019_(Resignation)
https://www.fsf.org/news/richard-m-stallman-resigns

        - Dan C.
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[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[spedraja]

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El mar., 17 sept. 2019 14:56, Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> escribió:

> Richard Stallman, known colloquially as 'RMS', has resigned from MIT's
> Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the Free
> Software Foundation, after making comments defending Jeffrey Epstein, the
> late sexual predator. Those comments sparked wide-spread outrage across the
> MIT community and beyond.
>
>
> https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#16_September_2019_(Resignation)
> https://www.fsf.org/news/richard-m-stallman-resigns
>
>         - Dan C.
>

And here is #FreeSoftwareFoundation #FSF note about Stallman's resignation.

https://www.fsf.org/news/richard-m-stallman-resigns

Cordiales saludos / Best Regards / Salutations / Freundliche Grüße
-----
Sergio Pedraja
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[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[imp]

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019, 1:56 PM Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:

> Richard Stallman, known colloquially as 'RMS', has resigned from MIT's
> Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the Free
> Software Foundation, after making comments defending Jeffrey Epstein, the
> late sexual predator. Those comments sparked wide-spread outrage across the
> MIT community and beyond.
>
>
> https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#16_September_2019_(Resignation)
> https://www.fsf.org/news/richard-m-stallman-resigns
>

This is an uppance long time in coming... his bad behavior has long ago
caused some communities to stop inviting him to their events..

Warner

        - Dan C.
>
> _______________________________________________
> COFF mailing list
> COFF at minnie.tuhs.org
> https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/coff
>
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[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[clemc]

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[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 974 bytes --]

It's interesting what finally got him.   His bad behavior has been around a
long time.
ᐧ

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 8:56 AM Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:

> Richard Stallman, known colloquially as 'RMS', has resigned from MIT's
> Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the Free
> Software Foundation, after making comments defending Jeffrey Epstein, the
> late sexual predator. Those comments sparked wide-spread outrage across the
> MIT community and beyond.
>
>
> https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#16_September_2019_(Resignation)
> https://www.fsf.org/news/richard-m-stallman-resigns
>
>         - Dan C.
>
> _______________________________________________
> COFF mailing list
> COFF at minnie.tuhs.org
> https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/coff
>
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[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[lm]

The interesting thing is that RMS has been saying stuff kids can agree
to sex with an adult for 15 years or more.  It's in his blog.

I think the reason he is out now is that he defended Epstein and the
Epstein stuff has a decent chance at taking down the administration and
some powerful professors like Minsky.  I can believe there is pressure
on those folks to give back the money and resign for the good of the
institution.  But those people don't want to leave, they want this to
blow over and RMS was bringing more unwanted attention.

If it really was just about his views, his views have been consistent
for a long time and MIT didn't care.  Kinda sleazy that they are booting
him to save their own skins but I have no empathy for RMS, I have kids.

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 10:00:26AM -0400, Clem Cole wrote:
> It's interesting what finally got him.   His bad behavior has been around a
> long time.
> ???
> 
> On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 8:56 AM Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> > Richard Stallman, known colloquially as 'RMS', has resigned from MIT's
> > Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the Free
> > Software Foundation, after making comments defending Jeffrey Epstein, the
> > late sexual predator. Those comments sparked wide-spread outrage across the
> > MIT community and beyond.
> >
> >
> > https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#16_September_2019_(Resignation)
> > https://www.fsf.org/news/richard-m-stallman-resigns
> >
> >         - Dan C.
> >
> > _______________________________________________
> > COFF mailing list
> > COFF at minnie.tuhs.org
> > https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/coff
> >

> _______________________________________________
> COFF mailing list
> COFF at minnie.tuhs.org
> https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/coff


-- 
---
Larry McVoy            	     lm at mcvoy.com             http://www.mcvoy.com/lm 

[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[clemc]

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[-- Attachment #1: Type: text/plain, Size: 2252 bytes --]

+1
ᐧ

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 10:20 AM Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:

> The interesting thing is that RMS has been saying stuff kids can agree
> to sex with an adult for 15 years or more.  It's in his blog.
>
> I think the reason he is out now is that he defended Epstein and the
> Epstein stuff has a decent chance at taking down the administration and
> some powerful professors like Minsky.  I can believe there is pressure
> on those folks to give back the money and resign for the good of the
> institution.  But those people don't want to leave, they want this to
> blow over and RMS was bringing more unwanted attention.
>
> If it really was just about his views, his views have been consistent
> for a long time and MIT didn't care.  Kinda sleazy that they are booting
> him to save their own skins but I have no empathy for RMS, I have kids.
>
> On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 10:00:26AM -0400, Clem Cole wrote:
> > It's interesting what finally got him.   His bad behavior has been
> around a
> > long time.
> > ???
> >
> > On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 8:56 AM Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:
> >
> > > Richard Stallman, known colloquially as 'RMS', has resigned from MIT's
> > > Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the Free
> > > Software Foundation, after making comments defending Jeffrey Epstein,
> the
> > > late sexual predator. Those comments sparked wide-spread outrage
> across the
> > > MIT community and beyond.
> > >
> > >
> > >
> https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#16_September_2019_(Resignation)
> > > https://www.fsf.org/news/richard-m-stallman-resigns
> > >
> > >         - Dan C.
> > >
> > > _______________________________________________
> > > COFF mailing list
> > > COFF at minnie.tuhs.org
> > > https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/coff
> > >
>
> > _______________________________________________
> > COFF mailing list
> > COFF at minnie.tuhs.org
> > https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/coff
>
>
> --
> ---
> Larry McVoy                  lm at mcvoy.com
> http://www.mcvoy.com/lm
>
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[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[toby]

On 2019-09-17 10:20 a.m., Larry McVoy wrote:
> ... the
> Epstein stuff has a decent chance at taking down the administration and
> some powerful professors like Minsky. ...
> 
Prof Minsky died January 24, 2016.

--Toby

[COFF] Stallman resigns under pressure from CSAIL and FSF.

[crossd]

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 10:00 AM Clem Cole <clemc at ccc.com> wrote:

> It's interesting what finally got him.   His bad behavior has been around
> a long time.
>

Indeed. I remember hearing about his predations years ago; they were
well-known then just as they are today. Nasty business like propositioning
the female custodial staff at MIT when he lived in his office; being sleazy
to women at conferences: as you say, he's been a bad actor for a long time.

I think that what got him was this era in which this latest kerfuffle
emerged into the public eye. People have finally had enough and are
(rightfully) demanding action against those who repeatedly behave poorly.
Women in particular are tired of being treated badly in CS and technology
in general and are pushing back (to which I personally say, "good. How can
I help?"). Hiding behind a thin guise of faux "rationality" or rhetoric or
appeals to pseudo-scientific "questions" or just being socially awkward is
no longer a shield for being a harasser or predator. The myth of the
quirky intellectual who delights in irreverent behavior as a foil to
established norms in order to break free to some higher level of thought
have been exposed as the shams they mostly are. These people aren't
geniuses, they're just jerks.

Stallman's position as the revered patron saint of Free Software has been
crumbling for some time; this outburst in the current environment was the
straw that broke the MIT camel's back.

        - Dan C.

PS: Semi-related story: during the aftermath of the 2013 Boston marathon
bombing, and in particular after the ambush-style murder of MIT police
officer Sean Collier, much of the greater Boston area was under lockdown
while combined police forces tracked down the bombers. Collier was killed
in his patrol car an intersection about a block from the Stata Center,
which houses CSAIL and Stallman's office. Stallman was known for propping
the doors to Stata open as he's somehow morally opposed to the RFID key
cards usually used for accessing MIT buildings (apparently he doesn't like
being "tracked"). During this time I'm told he raised something of a stink
because people were closing the doors: nevermind that armed killers who'd
already murdered a cop were running around the neighborhood. It's a great
example of letting the perfect (some abstract notion of "freedom") be the
enemy of the good (not getting killed because someone motivated to launch a
terrorist attack and actually murder people was running around outside).
The man is unreasonable and I'm not at all sorry to see him go. Like Larry,
I've got kids: I'm happy they'll grow up in a post-RMS world.

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 8:56 AM Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> Richard Stallman, known colloquially as 'RMS', has resigned from MIT's
>> Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the Free
>> Software Foundation, after making comments defending Jeffrey Epstein, the
>> late sexual predator. Those comments sparked wide-spread outrage across the
>> MIT community and beyond.
>>
>>
>> https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#16_September_2019_(Resignation)
>> https://www.fsf.org/news/richard-m-stallman-resigns
>>
>>         - Dan C.
>>
>> _______________________________________________
>> COFF mailing list
>> COFF at minnie.tuhs.org
>> https://minnie.tuhs.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/coff
>>
>
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[crossd]

Thomas Bushnell has written thoughtfully on this:
https://medium.com/@thomas.bushnell/a-reflection-on-the-departure-of-rms-18e6a835fd84

On Tue, Sep 17, 2019 at 8:56 AM Dan Cross <crossd at gmail.com> wrote:

> Richard Stallman, known colloquially as 'RMS', has resigned from MIT's
> Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory and the Free
> Software Foundation, after making comments defending Jeffrey Epstein, the
> late sexual predator. Those comments sparked wide-spread outrage across the
> MIT community and beyond.
>
>
> https://stallman.org/archives/2019-jul-oct.html#16_September_2019_(Resignation)
> https://www.fsf.org/news/richard-m-stallman-resigns
>
>         - Dan C.
>
>
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